Warburg-HIH Invest Real Estate said on Tuesday that it has opened dedicated offices in Paris and Madrid and hired two real estate experts to lead the local teams.

Dominique Dudan, a trained economist, will oversee Warburg-HIH Invest’s French business as a managing director from a dedicated office in Paris. She has almost 20 years of experience in the property sector and previously served for four and a half years as president of Union Investment Real Estate France and three years as president of a large private equity family office. She also held roles at HSBC Reim, BNP Paribas and Accor Hotel & Resorts.

Benita von Meding will head the new Warburg-HIH Invest office in Spain. Von Meding also has about 20 years of real estate experience having held different positions at major groups including Union Investment Real Estate, Bavaria Bankgesellschaft and Immobilien Team Consulting (ITC), a service provider specialising in shopping centres.

In the Netherlands, Warburg-HIH Invest has agreed on a regional cooperation for the Benelux countries with asset manager Cording. Cording will advise and support Warburg-HIH Invest from Amsterdam in all future investment activities across the Benelux countries and represent Warburg-HIH Invest as a local contact for market participants and service providers.

'As an international investment and asset manager, we want to position ourselves even more prominently in relevant markets. As part of this effort, we look particularly to expand our footprint across regional representations in the three countries in order to have our own contacts on the ground and increase our capacities in the respective markets,' said Andreas Schultz, managing director of Warburg-HIH Invest.